1793.the North Eaſt, a ſtrong wind and great ſwell carried us to Madeira in ſix days; on one of which alone we had fair weather. OnJanuary 20. the twentieth I had run that diſtance by two of Arnold's time-pieces and account: it alſo blew a ſtrong gale, very variable, with dark cloudy weather and heavy rain. I had not made any obſervation this day to be relied on, but ſuch as pointed out to me the like was not far diſtant, and that it became abſolutely neceſſary for me to aſcertain our true ſituation before night. I depended on the qualities of the ſhip for clearing the land if caught on a lee-ſhore, and accordingly ſhortened ſail to cloſe-reefed main-top-ſail and fore-ſail. We then hove too and houſed our boats: but we had no ſooner bore up, than, half a mile on the lea-beam, we deſcried the Deſerters Rocks: and as it was impoſſible to weather them on the tack we were then on, we wore and ſtretched out between Porto Sancto and the Eaſt end of Madeira; while it blew ſo heavy at intervals, that the ſhip lurched three ſtreaks of the main-deck under water: at the ſame time, ſhe made a better way through the water than we could expect or would generally be believed. When the gale had ceaſed, calms, light winds, and baffling weather, prevented our clearing the Weſt end of Madeira, until22. the evening of the twenty-ſecond of January.
My preſent intention was to paſs in light to the Weſtward of the Canaries; and29. at noon, on the twenty-